Widely known as The Cowboy Painter, Charles Marion Russell often depicted in his painting the day to day life of the American cowboy, the kind of people who took upon themselves the task of settling and profiting from the vast expanses of the American West. Quite commonly, he would portray that lifestyle in a rather humorous manner, which served both to humanize and recognize those men, as well as making them more palatable and friendly for the East Coast city-dwelling audiences. A side effect of this penchant for portraying the rough life of cattle punchers is that sometimes the title and subject of the paintings might seem a little bit arcane for those city dwellers, especially because Russell’s knowledge of the life of a cowboy was first hand, him having left his family home in Missouri to become a cowboy in Montana at the early age of 16.

This painting, for example, at first glance, is another of the many chaotic scenes painted by Russell when depicting the everyday life of cowboys. But the title gives us a clue about what sets this often reproduced 1909 oil on canvas apart from Russell’s other works. A cinch ring, also known as girth ring, is a piece of tack, or horse riding equipment, that serves to tighten the cinch to the horse. The cinch is the leather or mohair strap that is used to keep the saddle on the horse, stopping it from moving sideways and, in all likelihood, throwing the rider off the animal’s back, as seems to have happened in the situation depicted here.

From the visual cues added by Russell around the composition, the two cowboys in the foreground were attempting to geld or mark the steer that is shown uncomfortably laying with its hind legs in the air tied up to a rope that is secured to the black horse’s saddle. The issue is that most steers don’t take kindly to being gelded and in the struggle between the cowboy and the bovine the cowboy seems to have come out losing and has been thrown off his horse in a rather unceremonious manner. In that situation, the title of the painting begins to make more sense, explaining precisely what malfunctioned to put the cowboy in such a predicament. Further, while his partner’s reaction of drawing a rifle might seem a bit too much, take notice of the threatening figures in the distance. In a way, the painting shows that even a little failure to properly attach the saddle might lead to an actual predicament.